Former Ghana international Derek Boateng has opened up on Ghana’s first-ever win at a world cup at the 2006 FIFA World Cup against Czech Republic.
The Black Stars defeated Czech Republic who were the second-ranked team in the world 2-0 in that second group game played at the RheinEnergiestadion in Cologne, Germany.
Ghana had lost its first group game against Italy and was on the verge of exiting the tournament if they had lost to Czech Republic in the game.
Czech Republic had beaten USA in the first group game by 3-0 and were favourites heading into the Ghana game.
According to Derek Boateng, the Black Stars had nothing to lose and they were motivated to beat the best team in the World.
“We were not scared of playing against Czech Republic because we had played with some of their players in the league. We also had some best players in our team such as Sammy Kufuor, Michael Essien, Sulley Muntari. We had nothing to lose so we gave our all in the match, he told Ohene-Bampoe Brenya on Happy Sports on Happy 98.9FM;
“The team that we didn’t want to lose to was USA. The USA coach had written off Ghana and so we told ourselves even if we lose the two matches against Italy and Czech Republic we were not going to lose to the USA”, he said of the team they wanted to beat at the tournament.
Ghana progressed to the Round of 16 stage in their maiden World Cup appearance.
The Black Stars defeated Czech Republic and USA to book a place at the Round of 16 where they eventually lost 3-0 to Brazil to exit the competition.
By Herbert Boakye Yiadom
